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2019 IGF - MAG - Virtual Meeting - II

The following are the outputs of the real-time captioning taken during an IGF virtual call. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.

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>> CHENGETAI: Good afternoon, morning and, evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the second IGF 2019 MAG meeting. Just a few items, just to be just to remind you during the meeting, if you are not speaking, would you please mute and unmute only when the Chair calls for you.
And we are using the hands up speaking cue. The link is going to be posted in the chat. I hope Mary can see it just now, but we will post the link in the chat.
And when you speak, can you please speak slowly and it's being transcribed, so the transcribers give a chance for the transcribers to catch up and also if you say your names, please say it slowly.
Also just a reminder that this is being recorded, and transcribed and the transcription will be made available on the IGF website under the MAG heading.
There is also going to be a summary report which will be posted a couple of days later, by Friday, which will be posted to the website. And I think that's all with that. I will hand over the meeting to our chair, Lynn.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Chengetai. And Happy New Year to everyone. This is our virtual meeting, but the first one in the calendar year 2019. And thank you, as always to those that are participating in a time frame that's not during their normal business hours. I do think it's important to rotate the time so that everybody gets to share in the pain and pleasure of the different hours.
The first agenda item, of course, is to approve the agenda that was sent out last week. It is there in the WebEx room. Let me see if there are any other calls for any other business or any other comments on the agenda.
Seeing none, I will call the agenda approved and the first item we wanted to do was to review the draft agenda for our open consultation and MAG meeting at the end of the January. That was sent out to the MAG a couple of days ago. The first day is, I think, returning MAG members know is the day of open consultations and that's basically the day where we ask the community to share their thoughts, concerns, interests, items, guidance, et cetera. MAG members for the most part are expected to be there in a listening capacity. Of course, that reverses the day two and day three, when, in fact, we have the formal MAG meeting.
In both of those sessions, we are actually hoping this time, as well as covering, you know, the kind of traditional taking stock items, and review of various input mechanisms we have, such as the call for issues and clearly everything we heard at IGF 2018, and what we are hearing through the taking stock process, but we really wanted to focus a fairly significant part of the discussion time on some more strategic areas.
Again, the appointment of the MAG facilitates that. That's something that previous MAGs have long requested. I do hope that everyone is using their own networks to reach out to the community and make sure they are aware of the open consultation and make sure they are aware of the increased focus on strategic discussion with respect to expectations from IGF 2019 and beyond. And specifically, we're looking for some input on various high level statements, not only from IGF 2018, where, of course, we had Secretary General's comment and President Macron's comments from France but a few weeks earlier, we had inputs from the European Commission. Unfortunately Commissioner Gabriel, didn't get to give her speech on that day because she had a conflict and had to leave for another meeting.
I am hoping that we can get some additional readout, though, from the commissioner's office or from some of the commission participants ahead of ahead of MAG meeting.
We will also have in the open session and update on the IGF trust fund, pretty much to make sure that people are aware of the trust fund, its current status, what it funds, how it works, that sort of thing.
And then that will be followed by a donor's meeting over the lunch break. And then the last item on the end of the day is to cover various intersessional activities and other related Internet Governance activity from other UN organizations, intergovernmental organizations or any civil society, you know, private sector inputs as well. It's a very open session.
And as I said, day two and day three follows a fairly similar format. We're working with the secretary to make sure that the programs are as complimentary as possible and not redundant, even in the taking stock sessions. And we're expecting then the MAG, based on your own deliberations, with your own communities, since IGF based on what we hear in the open consultations to really have quite an extended discussion on some strategic imperatives for the IGF and possible implications or actions across the IGF set of activities.
That's pretty much the first day. And the second day, we are really looking to set a high level to a more general discussion on shaping the IGF program and shaping the work of the IGF, and all of its intersessional activities over the coming year.
So let me see I mean, there's still time for individual comments online, but let's see if there's any questions, comments, suggestions, you know, desired edits from the MAG here today.
I see we have Ben Wallis in the speaking queue, Ben you have the floor.
>> BEN WALLIS: Thank you, Lynn. I had a couple of questions about what we discussed on day three. There's a couple of items there. So the possible approaches and general outline of overall IGF 2019 preparatory process, I just wanted to make a suggestion that we would draw on the recommendations that come from the Working Group on workshop evaluation that Russia had been chairing last year. I seem to remember that they had a number of recommendations of how the evaluation process might be changed and it would be useful to draw on those when we get to that discussion. So that was a suggestion or a question.
And the other item was on the discussion on intersessional activities. So it's described in the agenda as a discussion, but I wanted to confirm or ask whether we're actually intending to leave Geneva with decisions, particularly about which Best Practice Forums and intersessional work streams should should be going forward in 2019.
I know last year, we weren't able to make a decision at our first face to face meeting and it took a few meetings until we had the resources available to go with the BPFs that he with wanted to. But at least, as an aim, I wonder whether we can aim to actually come away from Geneva with a decision to enable the BPFs to get started more quickly.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Ben. Those are both good points. To the first one, I think we will be take into consideration the work group evaluations in all of deliberations and activities. And next week, we have our third MAG meeting, where we will cover the status and any recommendations from each one of the Working Groups. So that will be a good and timely session.
To your second point, I with respect to the intersessional activities and whether it's discussion or we will have reached a decision point, I very much hope we are able to reach a decision point because obviously it facilitates the work getting done.
And I think we can disassociate when the consultants come on board and when the MAG takes its decision with respect to which BPFs they might for instance, that they might want to charter, what the proposed charter of that is, and then of course, significant outreach can continue to pull people in and any other kind of guiding documents that may be supporting the BPF. I don't think we need to either wait to make the decision or kick off the BPFs with respect to the consultants coming in.
If somebody believes different, I would like to hear that. And I think our ability to get to a decision point open the various intersessional activities depends to some extent on the preparation we all do between now and that meeting and the discussion we're able to have on today's meeting, where, you know, the substantive agenda is specifically focused on reviewing the various intersessional activities and recommendations that come out of those activities.
And I think the question then would be if, in fact, we are looking at a new BPF, for instance, that should come out of our discussions during the MAG meeting, after we hear from the taking stock, the call for issues and the community consultation. So, you know, it's likely to be my guess is it would be likely to be a mixture, one or two BPFs, the MAG may decide they want to recharter. It would be great if we had the charters to prove that meeting, if not, I think it should happen quite quickly after meeting, but there may also be some new or a new BPF that the group decides to charter on the basis of everything we hear at the MAG meeting and I think that would probably require a work on the charter and approval.
But, you know, at a high level, I think our goal should be to get the intersessional activities chartered or rechartered as early as possible in the cycle.
Anything further, Ben, or anyone else? I see Ben has put a comment in, saying, "thanks for the comments."
Any additional comments? Perhaps if that works for the Secretariat, we could review the agenda again on next week's call. People should send comments in between now and then, if they have suggestions or any clarifying questions, but that we look to finalize the agenda next Wednesday on our call.
And then my final comment on that is I would really appreciate if everybody would reach out to your networks, make sure they are very much aware of the open consultations, the ability to participate remotely and the fact that we are really looking at getting some input on some of the more strategic or meta level things we have been hearing over the last, well, few years, frankly, but they certainly took a ratchet up, I think in the last few months, not to mention, of course, there's the high level panel on digital cooperation that the Secretary General has chartered as well and their work is continuing in the background here.
Ben, you have the floor.
>> BEN: Thank you. I see and so I support the agenda, and, of course, we can have a final decision next week. If there are no other comments on it, at this point, I wonder whether this is a good point to just ask whether there's any news on the precise dates for the meetings in Geneva in April, and in Berlin in June?
I know we have got an idea that they would be during the WSIS Forum, and for the Berlin meeting, it would be on the 3 to the 5th, but the Secretariat was going to look into whether or not there might be a fourth day available to extend our discussions. There might not be any news to share at this point. I just thought I this might be the point at which to ask you.
Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I will turn that over to Chengetai in just a moment and maybe answer the discussion. We are pretty much asking who are we expecting presentations. Instinctively the organizations are ITU, UNESCO, and World Economic Forum, you know, sometimes other organizations. I don't know if Chengetai has an update on that as well. So I will ask him if he does to share any additional information on that point as well as if you can just inform us Chengetai on what the latest is with respect to the dates of the two meetings.
>> CHENGETAI: Okay. Lynn is correct. We don't have many updates to give you. For the WSIS, we are still waiting for ITU to finalize the schedule. And for June, it's currently 5 7 of June. We still have to discuss what the Germans if that is at all possible. Given what they have said, I don't think that's very likely, but we will still wait for their response.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Chengetai, while you are here, one thing we neglected to mention and I don't see them on the call, of course is that the host country has informed us of who the host country cochair is. She will, of course, be joining us at the meetings. Do you want to make that announcement?
>> CHENGETAI: Yes, we do have a country cochair, and I just have to look up the name so that I don't make a mistake with the name and title. Just give me two seconds on that.
For the updates, I think Timea's question, who do we expect to present the updates, right? Yes, anybody who has anything to do with Internet governance, I mean, ITU, the World Economic Forum, all of those people. We send out invitations and tell them that they can come and give us updates, even CSDD can give us an update on the meeting.
The other thing I wanted to note is we, of course, invited the digital corporation to give us an update. It will be after their meeting. Unfortunately, they cannot give us an update on they can only give us an update on the afternoon of day two. So we will slightly adjust the program to we have an update from them on the status of their deliberations and their report.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Chengetai. Maybe we can add a few brief updates on CENB, and the HLPDC and some of their recent activities and on the World Economic Forum as well. So we will just add those quick updates.
And okay. We will come back, Chengetai, once you have the title for Daniella.
Let's move to, again so we just stated that we will leave the agenda open f further review and comments and we will work to finalize it on next Wednesday's call. Again, please do reach out to your networks so that everybody is aware of both the MAG meeting and the open consultation and in particular, the fact that we are looking to advance some more strategic components.
So with that, I would like to move to review the 2018 intersessional work and looking forward to proposed intersessional activities for 2019. I'm going to ask Chengetai to just do a Chengetai, someone in the Secretariat to do a quick intro so that everyone understands the various types of activities that there are, and where they can find information on them and where they fit in the overall process and the MAG's responsibilities as it does differ depending on which intersessional activity we are talking about, and then we will go to the coleaders, the could facilitators and the cochairs of the various activities for an update.
I would really like the update to focus on sort of a status report of their activities from 2018. Obviously, reference any formal documentation or outputs from the effort and then any thoughts or recommendations or ideas they have, with respect to that work for 2019.
I'm going to ask Chengetai to walk through a couple of the quick introductory documents. And then if everybody is okay, I would like to start with the DCs. I think Marcus is one of the individuals who helps to facilitate the work of the DCs is on the call. We would like to get him and his comments in as early as possible. And then I would suggest that we move to the Best Practice Forums and then NRI and CENB. If that causes a problem for someone, if you could let me know in the background, I would appreciate it. Otherwise, we will move forward with with Chengetai then.
>> CHENGETAI: Okay. Thank you very much, Lynn.
I will just start off by giving a very brief overview as Lynn has mentioned or leave it up to each of the co facilitators to tell you exactly how to join their group and where they are on the website. I mean, while they are talking, Lewis is going to point it out on the screen.
For reference, I am going to refer to this document that Tamera and Susan made last year out of one of the documents that the Secretariat did, with nice graphics and I think it's better to use that than just text. So it's the second link on the input documents to the MAG virtual meeting. It's entitled IGF program framework chart.
And it seems like we have a different link here. But the link that I sent out on my email, yes, exactly. Thank you very much. So it just explains what the outputs, the inputs, et cetera, for the IGF processes are. As I said, it was my last year's. So we only have two MAG meetings here, but this year we are going to have three.
If we go to the second page, it says, yes, exactly that page, the community suggestions, what are the inputs into the IGF process. So at the very beginning, we have suggestions from the taking stock session and then we have the written contributions that we have asked stakeholders to submit and also the input through the open consultations on the first day for the stakeholders and the second day with the MAG.
We also have the reports from the workshop sessions and papers from the intersessional work, the Best Practice Forums, produce reports and also the Dynamic Coalitions produce reports and those are some of the inputs into the session I mean, we also joined with the open forums, et cetera, these all act as inputs. And one other input that's also often important, every single year, we do publish a book.
We publish in eformat to save trees but it's available for the previous years, 2018 is not out yet. There is a report on the proceedings of the IGF meetings. That's a nice, concise PDF book that you can download and keep.
So ahead of the consultation and the MAG meeting, I'm going to the second the next page, page 3. Yes. Thank you.
So the idea the Secretariat analyzes the submissions, the taking stock session and also the written inputs that we have received. And then during the MAG meeting, we have discussions on the first day that the stakeholders and then the second and third day during the MAG, of course, with the MAG and as I said, Best Practice Forums, maybe discuss the make policy program and IGF and MAG Working Group.
If we go to the next page, this just explains what the Best Practice Forums are. Why do we have Best Practice Forums? And it's to enrich potential IGF outputs and some people said we shouldn't call it best practices but we should call it good practices, but we do get the meaning of this it's a reference so that we have experts discussing. They have on an output document and people can go back to it and refer to it. I mean, one of our successful cases was setting up helping setting up ISPs in East Africa. They used what they gathered from the IGF and it helped them a great deal setting up the regional ISPs.
It's and so those are all potential documents. That's why these Best Practice Forums are important. They are based on community input and MAG supports the topics through the discussions. Experts are invited. We do have a consultant that is assigned to the Best Practice Forums and that consultant he or she is mutual person, who writes the deliberations, sometimes we have had heated discussions on different points of view, but all points of view are valid and it's up to the consultant to actually include those views. I mean there may be some dissenting views. It doesn't mean they should be excluded from the document, unless they are erroneous. And together with the consultants, the MAG, the MAG co facilitators, they can discuss those issues.
And if no resolution is found, we can always approach the MAG chair or myself and we'll help find a solution to them.
You can have quite literally discussions going on in the Best Practice Forums.
So BPFs are generally selected for one year, but they can be renewed. And if their work can be further developed, it is up to the best practice co facilitators or anybody else who is interested in picking up the mantle to make the case to the MAG. And based on the discussions and the support within the MAG, the MAG chair can decide whether or not to select the Best Practice Forum for renewal or say no, I think this is discussed. Maybe we should pocket for a year and come back to it later on or choose a different subject.
And so most of these subjects, they are supposed to be contemporary issues, issues that are of significance during that year. Of course, it is difficult to select at the very beginning what is going to be at the end of the year. Since it's a year long process, that's the way we do it. And once these are chartered or approved by the given the go ahead by the MAG chair, then the Secretariat looks for a consultant and the Best Practice Forum is set.
The Best Practice Forums usually have meetings, you know, twice every month or as needed and this should produce a good report at the end of the year.
For the next slide. Number five, yes.
The main intersessional quality program, so for the past three years, last year was phase three of the policy options for connecting and enabling the next billion and this is a community driven process and it was started during the year 2015 preparatory cycle.
Now, this doesn't mean that next year we should have a phase four of policy options of connecting and enabling the next billions. It's up to the MAG to decide whether to continue it or maybe it's time to have another main intersessional policy program. And just go to the next one. Sorry, I'm a little bit conscious of whether or not we are taking up I'm taking up too much time.
The main theme, we'll discuss that hater. So let me stop there.
What is missing, which I haven't discussed, is the Dynamic Coalitions. The MAG doesn't really choose the Dynamic Coalitions. But there are MAG facilitators or co facilitators that do pick up a role in coordinating the Dynamic Coalitions, holding discussions and also preparing them for sessions for the annual IGF meeting.
These Dynamic Coalitions are made up of three or more stakeholder groups who come together to discuss a particular topic, and this is available on the IGF websites and we have well, there is long running one and very successful one is the Dynamic Coalition on accessibility and disability.
In fact, when we go to a host country, we have a section that was made by this Dynamic Coalition On Accessibility and Disability, and they provided us with a check list to make sure that the venue and also the surrounding hotels around there have rooms that are accessible to people with disabilities. So the idea does work closely with some of these Dynamic Coalitions. We have Dynamic Coalitions on Internet Governance and climate change, et cetera.
The MAG doesn't really have a role in their formation, as I said, but we do they do play a role? Coordinating, holding the meetings and making sure that the Dynamic Coalition is do adhere to the values and the principles of the IGF.
And this is another example of our intersessional work, I will leave that to Anja to explain. She will explain that in I think it is at the end of this session.
Have I forgotten anything else? I'm asking mainly Eleonora.
>> ELEONORA: No, I think you covered all the intersessional activities.
>> CHENGETAI: Okay. I think with that, if there's any general questions, I will give it back to Lynn and we can go back to the co facilitators.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Chengetai. I think in the past years there were questions over the various roles and the various activities and so this set of documents which were initially produced by the Secretariat through a MAG Working Group on multiyear strategic work program and then put into the presentation, you were just walking through by some additional members of last year's Working Group on multiyear strategic work program. And that currently is out for consultation with the community as well.
But it's a very useful document, and provides the links to all the guiding documents as well. So I do encourage everybody to look through that.
With that, let me just turn to Markus, who has been one of the individuals who was actually kind of facilitated the work of the DCs over the years to see if there's anything additional he wants to add to Chengetai's comments. DCs play a slightly different role than some of the other intersessional activities. Markus, you have the floor.
>> MARKUS KUMMER: Yes, thank you. Good evening, good morning to everyone. My co facilitator, is somewhere in the Austrian mountains in the deep snow and so I'm taking on the role of talking about the DCs. As Chengetai said, they are slightly different from all the other intersessional activities as they are self constituted and they are bottom up and in a way independent. But over the past four years, we have increasingly tried to bring them into the fold of the IGF community, and we have organized also common sessions and they are microns into it because it's essentially the mark that improves the overall program. And the slots given to the various constituents and the DCs have moved on the very first common session they had was each one presented themselves. And we have moved more towards having common sessions. Last year was on the common session the common session was co organized with the business community.
And we had follow up discussion on how to move on. And one discussion, one possibility that was discussed was actually moving towards a common output of all the DCs on a common theme, but we are not there yet. That is on the discussion, but you see on the screen all the various really multi facets content and obviously all of the MAG members are cordially invited to join any DC that might actually appeal to that personal interest and I think for all the newcomers it will be very interesting to look at what's happening.
All the activities are very transparent. It's all online. They adhere to some common principles. They have to be open. The archives have to be open and open to membership and that is administered by the Secretariat. And as I said, the information is online and you can also look up, we have regular common sessions, coordination sessions where we discuss how to move forward and all the reports are also online.
So I think I will leave it at that and maybe Eleonora may fill in if I left out anything. Again, worthwhile to retain for you as they are as such self constituted bottom up. But the overall responsibility of the program and how to hand out the slots is the responsibility of the MAG.
In the past, each DCs is automatically given a slot for their own meeting. At the annual meeting if they have proof of having done some substantive intersessional work but what we have done in past few years is also moved towards having a common session and that will be part of the discussions going forward. I think I can leave it at that. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Markus and I appreciate you stepping in as well.
Maybe one other quick comment. At the IGF, last year's IGF, in fact, there was a new DC that was established on DNS issues. And I know one of their specific interests in establishing a DC was, of course, the community that it can pull in to address some of these issues.
They are also very hopeful that they can move forward with some fairly kind of tangible outputs from the DC as well. So, again, just another kind of iteration on both the work of the DC and some of the activities taking place across the ecosystem with respect to more tangible tangible outputs.
Eleonora, was there anything that you wanted to add? Or Chengetai?
>> ELEONORA: Hi, Lynn. Thank you.
I was actually going to write it into the chat, but I think Markus did cover everything. I was just going to make one small addition saying it's also worth mentioning over time and over the course of their coordination activities, DCs are not just moving towards working on a common theme, which Markus said they may be on the cusp of doing in 2019, or a common output, but they have also, in a bottom up way, which is really quite impressive, developed their own standards for quality of work and common and common rules to follow. So that has been one of the big successes of the coordination work over the years.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Eleonora. I would add that it's one of the major outreach vehicles, I think the IGF has as well in terms of being able to pull individuals or organizations in that have the specific interest and the topic where perhaps maybe they are not interested in Internet Governance broadly. So I think that's also been another key benefit there, the same as with the Best Practice Forums.
So I don't see any requests from the floor for MAG members. So why don't we move to the Best Practice Forums. This past year, 2018, we had four of them. Maybe just do this in sort of alphabetical order. So we had one on artificial intelligence, Internet of Things and big data. And I think TD is actually prepared to give us a status report on that one. TD?
>> CONCETTINA CASSA: Thanks for giving me the floor. Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I can hear you well.
>> CONCETTINA CASSA: I want to give a report on what we have done last year. As you know, the best practice on Internet of Things, big data and artificial intelligence, it focuses on the three technologies are combined to go and are used collaborative in the Internet context. And so, as you know, devise the network application are used by billions of users around the world, and they generate high volume of data.
So they actually they play a critical role in connecting, analyzing a value from this huge amount or information. And the expectation on how this technology contributes to solve a problem and to face global challenges are very high and in several fields as an environment, transportation, as and so on.
And at the same time, there are a lot of potential impacts that may not reach the economic implication that actually can come from applying this free technology.
So we have a very quite fruitful discussion last year that resulted in a lot of issues and among that there's cybersecurity of IoT devices and not so recently related to the artificial intelligence and to human rights security, and social creation.
So, actually, there was a very intensive discussion also on ethical ethical issues. We have done a survey last year just to identify the main topic on which we should focus. And the survey has identified five main items, with accountability, security, privacy, transparencies and education also.
And then the best practice are also have different aspects and then several best practices have been tested from the Working Group. And some of them are related to the definition and the terminology, as it was stressed that it's important to when you discuss about the topics related to the technology, to define the terms, so that it's clear for policymakers, and stakeholders, what are the aspects of this technology that should be discussed?
And also, another best practice that came out was about being Ecumenical about technology. So try to be technology neutral.
And there were other aspects that came out, especially to improve the discussion between the stakeholders. Those best practices refer to have more collaboration. So to be sure that this technology are deploying, and ways that protect the user privacy and the security, and the resiliency while forcing innovation.
And another best practice was about considering ethics in the human rights when applying IoT, big data and artificial intelligence. And then again, we are charged with bias and incomplete data sets.
And then another aspect was to make privacy and transparency a policy goal and a business practice. So about practical activities, as I said, the BPF last year, it was kicked off on the 15th of June 2018, and then there were meetings until the IGF meeting in November. So from the 15th of June to the to the beginning of November, the BPF has recognized a very interesting workshop on day three of the IGF meeting. And there's mixed stakeholders with representative academia, with the government, and civil society, and with all the experiences and the best practice with the big data and the Internet Governance perspective.
The BPF also had a draft out of the 1st of November, and then the final output document was published on December after the IGF meeting and it's available on the website.
As next steps, at the party's workshop, the BPF had an exchange of views and possible next steps on IoT, big data and AI, and it was suggested to further complete the best practice documents, and the use of IoT big data, especially in areas such as healthcare, environmental poll s and infrastructure.
So we have the need to develop and announce trust in this technologies. Okay.
And it was over a fact that the BPF should benefit more and more valid participation.
And we also plan to continue the work on 2019. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Let me see if there are any comments or reflections from MAG members and then maybe we will come back and does Didi when she thinks the group would have a concrete proposal to move forward for rechartering the BPF.
I'm seeing any comments or questions from MAG members. Do you know when you would actually have a concrete proposal? With a new charter for the BPF?
>> We have tried to finalize by the 22nd of January, generally as you asked. I think the deadline is the 22nd of January. Did I understand well?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes. Yes. Okay. That's excellent. Excellent. Thank you.
Then let's go to the BPF in cybersecurity, and then I think you are going to give us a status report there?
>> BEN WALLIS: Yes, thank you, Lynn.
So this year, the work has focused on the culture, norms and values in cybersecurity, and that work can be seen in three outputs.
First, there was the production of a multi stakeholder research paper on these topics. Then we launched a call for contributions and we received 16 responses, and finally we held a session at the IGF in Paris.
So that research paper and the contributions, the summary of the contributions and the report of the Paris session can be found in the final report for 2018.
The one disappointment I would report is that from the responses we didn't receive any from governance. But that's something we hope to work on if we can continue working this year.
So there were three key lessons learned from this year's work. Firstly the importance of norms as a mechanism in cybersecurity for state and non state actors to help those actors agree on a responsible way to behave in cyberspace.
And this is because the speed of legislation often struggles to keep up with the pace of changes in the sphere of cybersecurity.
The second lesson was about the importance of multi stakeholderism, threats to cybersecurity, impact governments, private companies and people, and more needs to be done to involve the non state stakeholders in the implementation of norms.
And finally cybersecurity norms and laws should be respectful of human rights and not stray into areas such as freedom of expression and control of content online. It's important to separate the security of the infrastructure, which this BPF is focused on, from questions of content shared online.
Now, as well as the final report, we also have a good overview of the work of the BPF over the last three years, in a slide deck that was presented at a conference by the BPF's lead expert Martin van Hoenbeck. So output links to both are in the chat now.
And the first point I would make is that should the MAG decide to continue the work of the cybersecurity BPF in 2019, I would be happy to continue serving as the MAG co convener. That is not a decision for today, but I wanted to offer that up.
And I would like to discuss what could be tackled. The 2018 meeting in Paris saw the French government call for security in cyberspace. It has more than 450 signatories now. It includes 58 governments and many organizations and civil society from the technical community and from academia.
And the call, the Paris call, it sets out some high level commitments and it recommends nine areas where cooperative measures should be taken. And I think that the IGF cybersecurity BPF is very well positioned to do something and make the focus of the BPF's work this year. We can frame our work around the commitments and the recommended measures set out in the call and aim to collect relevant examples of best practice and to identify existing forums and networks which are addressing or are well placed to address the areas identified in the Paris call.
I have been working with Markus Kummer, my co convener and with the BPF's Martin van Hoenbeck, and I will circulate that to the MAG after the call today.
I'm not suggesting that the IGF should take on ownership of the call or responsibility for its implementation, but it seems clear to me that this is an initiative that the IGF should be looking to contribute to, and I'm also conscious that that was a request we received from President Macron in Paris. He was looking for the IGF to contribute to the call and wanted to see it further discussed in Berlin.
So, yes, I'm seeing it more about the IGF providing a concrete contribution to be fed into whatever process is created to take this call forward.
Finally, I would just say that I very much hope that the BPFs can begin work as soon as possible after a face to face meeting, including with the consultants who will support the BPFs, although I know it will take a while to get them in place and the contracts sorted out. After the delayed seating of the MAG last year, then it took a while for the MAG to approve the intersessional work streams and then there was a delay before the consultants were approved. It's great that we are starting so early this year and the proposed 2019 timeline presented by the Secretariat is really encouraging in terms of suggesting a much earlier start for the BPFs this year and I hope that comes to pass.
And I would leave the floor open if Markus, my co convenor wants to add anything.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Markus.
>> MARKUS KUMMER: Ben was not able to be in Paris. I moderated the session. And it was under the Macron speech and there was a strong feeling in the room that, indeed it was a unique opportunity for the IGF to have this high level invitation to do something that should not be remiss and also it could be an incredible opportunity to bring in governments which we have been missing in many of our work and thus we have 50 or more governments already signing up for the Paris call.
And we have in the past noticed that governments have been very reluctant to join into the discussions on cybersecurity, but there's something that I signed up to do and that really could be a great opportunity to involve governments and bring them into this process.
That was a firsthand reaction back in Paris, but we have worked on that and we have a proposal, that has been said, that can be submitted to the MAG for consideration at the meeting.
Thanks.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Markus and thank you, Ben. Is there anybody who is looking for the floor, comments or questions?
One the things that I think could be interesting, not getting ahead of any ultimate decision by the MAG, but Ben, you said, you know, maybe there's a possible for the BPF to make a concrete contribution into, you know, the work driven by the call. I think it might also be interesting to consider whether or not there was an opportunity to look at the kind of processes that support these activities and how one might participate in them. And I'm saying that, a little because of some of the discussions in the background and the HLPDC and if we look at the myriad of calls or the norms or the various packages that are put out for support, how that's done and how that's done well taking into account, of course inclusiveness and that sort of thing could be quite an interesting approach as well. And one that I think the IGF is quite well placed to address.
I throw that out you as there with the BPF. I assume you are fine with the timetable of January 22nd based on your comments earlier but looking for a positive confirmation there.
>> BEN WALLIS: Yes, I will send it out this afternoon, actually, my time, after the call. And yes, that was something that we were aware of, as your suggestion that we don't just look at practical elements, best practices to we don't just look at practical best practices to respond to the recommendations of the call, but that we could also identify venues where work is already being undertaken kind of in response to the priorities set out in the call. So yes, I will certainly take your suggestion on board.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: It was more a comment than a suggestion.
It needs to come from the community as a whole, than the MAG. It bears no extra weight because I commented.
>> BEN WALLIS: Objection. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Thank you, Ben.
The next BPF, gender. And I think if I'm direct we have Radhika who will speak on gender and access.
>> RADHIKA: Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we can hear you well.
>> RADHIKA: The forum addresses how women can meaningfully connect to the Internet, while addressing barriers that are specific to gender. So 2018 was the fourth phase of BPF gender. And the focus of the work was on the impact of supplementary models of connectivity in enabling meaningful access for women (No audio) community networks and there was an explicit gender focus which supports these models of connectivity. So (No audio)
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: You are breaking it up a little bit. It's very clear and then there's no audio as well. I'm not quite sure. Maybe Luis can help to troubleshoot that in the background as well. But do continue.
>> RADHIKA: Is it more audible now?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: What we can hear you, it's excellent. It's just that sometimes it stops completely. But let's continue on and hope it holds.
>> RADHIKA: I can also place that into the comments once I finish.
(No audio).
So as I was saying, our findings include that benefits of these models of connectivity for women and nonbinary persons help in overcoming the barriers that some of the previous years were (No audio) meaningfully and what we also done this year is come up with some high level policy recommendations or rather best practices for incorporating gender perspectives while developing these models.
And the BPF gender work as always was carried out in a bottom up, multi stakeholder and community driven manner. We had surveys and engagements with the mailing list, email list engagements, mobile messaging, et cetera, and the output is in the form of an (No audio).
Another day or two. But the pre IGF draft is up. I want to highlight some of the successes that we felt the (No audio) that for the first time this year, there was an expansion from going beyond the gender binary and from talking not just in terms of men and women, but also including the experiences of gender nonbinary persons, as well as trans persons in the in this year's work. And I think that sets an important precedent for the intersessional activities going forward at IGF, and we also (No audio) very few initiatives that focus on a gender focus and therefore, this report was will hopefully be key in helping (No audio) we know if we don't have an explicit gender focus while setting up Internet connectivity then its benefits are not going to accrue to to women as well as other gender minorities.
The BPF session at IGF was well received and many of the participants who attended the session reached out and expressed interest in being more actively involved going forward, if the work is renewed. So there has been a lot of enthusiasm that was expressed for the BPF to be renewed, and the session also had a (No audio) if we go ahead with the BPF gender next year and some of the MAG members on the call today were also present at the session and gave these and gave these inputs. (No audio) audible for the most part of it?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That ink you Radhika, it just seems that there was buffering or microcuts that were coming in periodically. If you could send your comments or your remarks even just sending them out in an email and we'll make sure the transcript gets completed.
And are you also the one thing that was not particularly clear is kind of the BPF's intent for 2019. Is there current work underway on a proposal to extend or is there a suggestion otherwise?
>> RADHIKA: Right, I mentioned there are conversations on renew it, because there was a lot of enthusiasm expressed even (No audio) that can be taken up. So, for example, like going beyond just access to after access issues for women on the BPF gender but in terms of a formal document, I will just have to get back to the conveners of the BPF and get back to you on that, if that's all right.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That's excellent. And that was much more clear. Thank you.
Any comments or questions from MAG members for Radhika or any other MAG members would participated in the BPF, have any additional comments?
All right. Then we'll move to the Best Practice Forum local content. Giacomo, are you going to provide the status report? Giacomo?
>> LUIS: Hi, Lynn, This is Luis. Giacomo does not seem to be connected. Let me check if he is a caller, maybe?
>> GIACOMO: I'm on the call but the mic doesn't work. I'm now muted or unmuted?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We can hear you. You are unmuted.
>> GIACOMO: Okay. Thank you. Happy new year to everyone. On BPF on local content. Because it's to the left of the MAG meeting and so I'm doing this report on behalf of them.
This year the BPF on local content changed the focus from previous year and included in the debate the activities that the main IGO that are active in the field are doing. And trying to bring them into the debate of the Internet Governance, where they have not been very active under this profile in the past years.
Namely, this year, we had the participation and involvement of WIPO, of UNESCO, some broadcasting association, including the African one. The world association of producers and others.
This brings into the debate the new voices that before were not participating or were not very active, and this was to try to build bridges between analog and digital world and provide cooperation among all the stakeholders. Final session in Paris was reached and attracted best practices from four continents and was very lively.
And even not only best practice of existing projects, existing achievement but programs that are on development and ongoing.
I'm happy to say, for instance, after the BPF event in Paris, the European Union supported a number of projects between the digital and analog world for content in Africa.
For me, this is one of the kind of things that that is very good that the IGF can produce as an impact on the reality.
Also I think it was very noose for those who participated at UNESCO, the night of the BPF discussion, there was a premier of a Nigerian movie that was released online and in cinema at the same time, that was very, very moving and was the first female motion director, that it was seen by about 1000 people in the UNESCO headquarters.
Of course because of this result and the attention for this discussion was growing towards the ends of the period because we started quite late, let's say, but then a lot of people were attracted in the discussion. There is intention to continue also next year, if possible and the proposal will be standing time before the 22nd of January as requested.
Eventually, if we probably he can say some words about the documents because he prepared and the work mainly on the document. And I use this opportunity to invite especially the new MAG members that are interested in the content that are doing activities related to contents and services and local reality to to join us and to enrich the coordination group. Thank you very much and Lynn you agree, I would ask Wim to compliment what I said.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. Excellent, Giacomo. Wim, you have the floor.
>> WIM DEGEZELLE: Wim speaking.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: You are a little bit faint.
>> WIM DEGEZELLE: Is this better?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: That's better.
>> WIM DEGEZELLE: So I'm happy to give a brief overview on all the topics that Giacomo already raised. Like the other BPFs, the BPFs on local contents had a series of the virtual meetings starting in July until November, in which the topic was discussed and the approach for this year sorry, our laws here or better was developed.
In 2017, there was BPF and local content that explored the topic of relevant local content and how it can help the development and growth of a local Internet, summarizing one sentence that is if the content on the Internet is relevant for people, for local people, the people will be tempted to use the Internet. So the Internet will grow and they can benefit from it and they can develop a local Internet economy.
In 2018, the BPF decided to continue to work but focus on really the development of local content value chain. Instead of looking for voluntary non for profit, they really focused on a valid change initiatives that can generate on their own and can be sustainable.
In more theoretical level, the BPF discussed three different types of initiatives, that exists and in the first place that was a number of new models, a number of new initiatives that completely new models linked to the Internet and linked to content and local content on the Internet.
A second level that was discussed at the BPF was the discussion of an enabling environment for creation of local content. The BPF looked at specific policies, specific projects and special initiatives.
And then the their level they considered existing models for the promotion and the support of the creation of local content that includes also the digitalization of content, existing content from an analog world into the online world.
But like I said, it was the first level in the discussion that was more theoretical and more practical. The second part of the document is based on specific case studies, case studies that were also discussed and highlighted at the discussion we had in Paris.
Giacomo already mentioned the case studies themselves were very they came from different parts of the world, amongst other case studies that were discussed on the high speed Internet and the development of high tech for mountain communities in Georgia.
The independent movies and online content productions and initiatives in Africa, amongst other we had the producer and the greater of the movie that Giacomo mentioned and that was show cased at UNESCO. We had the person discussing how she created the movies and what kind of difficulties she had and what the issues are.
Next there was also a case study to discuss an initiative to promote and support the production of local film, as well as local web series in Colombia. And we heard from Armenian examples to create online education platforms and also a network of elibraries in Armenia and the local language.
As a last point we had a discussion within the BPF and at the workshop, on the importance of IDNs and so international domain names and more importantly, the issue of universal acceptance, what is the issue that still today, even if there are IDN domain names in the local scripts, not in SQL, or not in script, and not all programs are a lot of online applications, they do not accept those domain names. For example, if you have a domain name or an email address in for example, Chinese name, it may be that a lot of browsers or applications will not accept that email address.
There are a number of case studies and examples that were highlighted or highlighted in the document. The document was published ahead of the IGF meeting and then the final output document was published on the website. You can see the executive summary and the link to the full document on the website and that's was just before the end of the year.
I think that's all. So I would like such a thank you. Thank all the people that contributed to the BPF. Thank you Giacomo and Lynn.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Giacomo and Wim. Very interesting.
Are there any comments or questions for Giacomo or Wim on BPF local content?
Carlos, you have the floor.
Carlos, you appear to be unmuted. You appear to be unmuted, but we can't hear. You can't hear you.
>> LUIS: It appears they have turned the microphone of Carlos. I will try to help him offline.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay. Thank you. And if Carlos can come back in later, we will let him in or perhaps put your comments in the chatroom as well. Let me just take and now there's an echo.
If you are not actively speaking, if you could mute.
The Luis
>> LUIS: Give it some seconds but try to follow.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Let's see if that's better. Carlos, I do hope that you are able to get audio and if not, perhaps you can put your comments in the chatroom. And Carlos is a new MAG member, an incoming MAG member but he's been involved in IG discussions and processes for many, many years. Could you even say decades.
I want to remind the MAG members that this point we have heard from the four BPFs and there is a desire from each one of them to continue their activities over the coming year. As the Secretariat will tell us, BPFs are not resource neutral. And that they do both require and get consultant support to help process through their activities. So there is both a limit in terms of resources that are available. There's also, I think often a community limit in terms of how much we can support in terms of all the activities across the IGF ecosystem.
So I'm sharing that just so that when we move forward to our discussions at the end of the month, if the MAG should feel that any additional or additional BPFs are required that there is a possibility that we would have a resource constraint and not be able to support all of them. And also at the same time, a request to the Secretariat to work over the next couple of weeks to see if we can get a better sense of the number of BPFs we could support with respect to funding resources for the for the consultants, again so we can make maximum progress on this at the face to face MAG meeting.
Let me if Carlos still can't get in I will wait for a note from either Carlos or the Secretariat. Carlos, I will mute now and let's see if we can hear you.
>> LUIS: Hi, Lynn, sorry. He told me was having a problem with his microphone. We hear the echo when he has his line open.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Luis. Thank you, Carlos.
Why don't we at this point move to the NIRs and we'll hear from the focal point within the Secretariat Anja on that, and then we'll move back and hopefully we'll be able to hear Radhika with the enabling and connecting the next billions. If the sound is not working there, we will take that to email.
Anja, you have the floor.
>> ANJA: Thank you very much. Hello to everyone, I hope you can hear me.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: It's very faint.
>> ANJA: Thank you. I will try to speak louder. It's probably my microphone.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: It's still faint but better.
>> ANJA: Let me start with a couple. Links that will lead you to the IGF website relevant pages for the end user, you can learn about the nature and the work that they are doing together and it will allow while you are exploring the website, I will start very briefly with the origin and the background of the NRIs and what is their nature, which I think it's very important for the working modalities that exist between the global IGF and the NRIs.
So the NRIs are organic in their creation. They are completely independent and autonomous. They were created back since 2006, the number was growing and today we are very fortunate to say that there are more than 110, well, precisely 112, nationally, regional and new IGFs.
The role of the Secretariat as per the bottom up agreement of the NRIs is to officially and formally recognize the NRIs as the IGF initiatives that are listed on the IGF website. That recognition is done in line with the core characteristics and principles that the NRIs are adhering to, primarily and that means that they are multi stakeholder, which means at least three different stakeholder groups are involved in their organizing committees.
Their work is bottom up, which means community led. They are fully open and transparent, inclusive and, of course, noncommercial.
Sorry, I had an echo in the background.
As I said, at the present moment, we had 81 officially recognized national IGFs. If you go to the link that's posted in the chat, you can see the spread of those national and regional IGFs and new IGFs globally. It was per the regional groups which I think is a good overview of the coverage across the various regions.
Last year, during the 2018, there were more than 73 annual meetings organized by the NRIs. If you also go on the link that refers to the collaborative work of the NRIs, you can actually see the timeline of those meetings.
The NRIs are, as I said completely independent and autonomous, but they are important partners when it comes about getting the inputs from a local level to the global IGF but also quite powerful machine when for for making an effective outreach to various countries and regions from the side of the global IGF.
In order to maintain and
(Technical difficulties)
Aside of the main session, the NRIs have different, of course, priorities when it comes to broad topics. Some do overlap and some of them, of course have priorities that maybe are different among each other, but those that have similar priorities they host the so called collaborative sessions. So at the Paris IGF, more than 32 NRIs worked on organizing five collaborative sessions on the digital economy, the fake news and emerging technologies. All of these topics were developed through process that was quite time consuming, I would say, run across more than 100 NRIs in a bottom up manner to develop these topics and the whole peremptory process was done in a bottom up way.
Aside of the main session and collaborative session, the NRIs also organized traditionally since Mexican IGF in 2016, the coordination session, which is an open work meeting between all the NRIs between our colleagues and the chair of the MAG and the entire IGF Secretariat with the presence of wider IGF community to kind of take stock of what's being done by that meeting and what needs to be done in order to improve the mutual collaboration.
A side of these activities that I mentioned, I think it's worth mentioning that the NRIs are seen by the global IGF as very important contributors to the intersessional work. Last year, for example, the BPF leaned a lot to inputs from the NRIs, consulting the NRIs trying to get the input from the local level and then included in the final output document analysis.
We will see for this year to even strengthen to even more strengthen the collaboration that exists between the NRIs and the intersessional work depending which BPFs will be approved as final.
And aside of these sessions and activities that are being prepared throughout the year to be presented on the IGF annual meeting, as I said, the NRIs meeting serves a particular interest to us. So the IGF Secretariat attends mostly online those meetings and is trying to get inputs that are relevant for the IGF for the intersessional work and so on. And where we can, we also attend in person.
And finally, the NRIs also are producing some significant output document collectively. One of those document produced in the bottom up manner is the NRIs toolkit that is translated by the NRIs' volunteers to all six UN languages that look at and explains how certain communities can organize national origin or IGFs. The youth IGFs have been described in a specific publication. I believe I posted the link also in the chat.
For this year, we are still about to start formal process formal bottom up process to identify the objectives for this year.
The way I see it now we entered the last year on December 19, with a very good meeting. There will be an interest again for a joint session and a specific topic and also for these collaborative sessions but the NRIs also expressed their commitment, many of them, at least to the to contributing to the IGF intersessional work.
So that would be, I think, all for me but if you have any questions, I'm here. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Anja. Let me see if there are any comments or questions. We have a number of MAG members that are active in their NRIs as well if there's anything else they would like to add. I cannot see any additional comments or requests.
I mean I think as Anja explained very well and said very well, the NRIs are one of the most important achievements if you will coming out of the IGF ecosystem. And not only do they help inform and enrich the discussions at a global level, of course, they help advance issues that are important to more local communities and provide additional opportunities for engagement as well, given exclusivity and extending our reaches is so important to the activities.
Was there someone else who was trying to come in?
>> CARLOS: Hello?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, held local.
>> CARLOS: It's Carlos!
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Hi, Carlos.
>> CARLOS: Well, I sent my comment through the chat. So I don't know if you caught it.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: We did see it and I think it was interesting. I mean, if you want to read it out, since you have voice, I think it's
>> CARLOS: The problem is that I had to reconnect and lost the chat. I will try to reproduce it any way.
It's regarding the local content Best Practice Forum and I read the report. Very interesting. And I think there is an issue, which is not been contemplating any of the forums that we have been dealing with, which is how to preserve the official information from local governments or regional governments and so on. Oh, I found it, the comments are here now.
Okay. So when there are changes in government, sometimes entire ministries disappear and with them, possibly precious historical information, like right now, in my country, the minister of culture is being closed down and a lot of precious information which is there we don't know what will happen with it, you know?
I wonder if the Best Practice Forum could also consider best practices in preserving official information which should be kept available in the name of the transparency.
That's basically it. Thanks.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Carlos.
I will drop you a note separately because I know there was an effort out of Harvard University to mirror mirror is not the right word but to duplicate that. And maybe there's an opportunity to connect those two but I will drop you a separate note on that. As I said in the chatroom, I think it's an interesting idea.
Just coming back to the the NRIs, were there any additional comments? I did see one earlier from Timea, which is suggesting some additional information be provided in terms of for the BPFs both without pulling it up in front of me, the number of participants, the outreach, the organizations, the region, that sort of thing. And maybe I could ask the Secretariat to work with some of the co facilitators, coleaders, and put together a template that did actually pull, you know, some of the important kind of characteristics or statistics together. I'm not even just as a measure of kind of goodness, if you will, about the BPF, but I think just in terms of sharing kind of outreach successes and mechanisms and that sort of thing would be would be interesting.
So if we could ask, again, the Secretariat to work on pulling together the template for some of that additional information and help the BPF leaders to pull it together for the submission on the 22nd, that would be really helpful.
>> CHENGETAI: Okay. Sure thing.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Chengetai.
Let me see if we have just five minutes, Radhika, if the connection is good enough to talk about the connecting and enabling the next billions, and if not, we will take that to the mailing list or add it to next week's call. Let me see if Radhika is still there.
>> RADHIKA: Can you hear me this.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Very faint, but yes.
>> RADHIKA: Let's hope the connection.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: If you speak a little bit louder.
>> RADHIKA: Is this audible?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Just barely.
>> RADHIKA: Let me just try and in case it gets cut off or it's not audible, I could send it
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I mean, I can hear Radhika, but I'm in a quiet place.
>> LUIS: Radhika, you may want to go to the audio menu. In the audio connection, the first option, you can collect the level of your microphone and you can put it to the maximum, okay?
So to the audio menu, the audio connection and then the microphone, you make it the maximum. Otherwise, speak very high and the others we put our volume to the highest level. And that should end.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you so much, Luis.
>> RADHIKA: I apologize again for my Internet connectivity, but let me try to be brief about the CENB update. I will share a clearer view on mail to fill in the gaps.
And phase four, that's connecting and enabling (No audio) supplemental policy recommendations that were made in the first three years that were conducted from 2015 to 2017 with some concrete case studies that highlight the way (No audio) development goals. So this year, there were four SDGs in focus that is SDG7 to ensure affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern internet for all. SDG8 for decent work and economic growth. Nine, for industry and innovation and infrastructure and 17, which is partnership for the goals. So all of these so what we did was collect an edited compilation of the case studies fork he cussing specifically on local and regional (No audio) initiatives are helping countries and communities make progress on the sustainable development goals, and we received some contributions from all over the world and the methodology that we followed for this was mainly that we had an open call for inputs and we have received we have received inputs that was then supplemented by the inputs that we have were given during the session and even the session was well received at IGF where we had some MAG members, as well as invited panelists who were working in this field to talk to us about the relevance of these SDGs for further goals of Internet connectivity and (No audio) and working with along the same themes and we also had some MAG members present to give us some understanding of of how the idea of connecting and enabling the next billions.
So fast last year is when SDGs, 4, 5, and 9 were in focus for CENB. It was when the local case studies started to be highlighted, because before that, the previous years focused on more high level, you know, of how we can achieve the same ends.
So this year, with the four SDGs that we looked at and and we continue this in 2019 by looking at looking at more of the SDGs that have not been explored so far in CENB and also to (No audio).
And as I mentioned, the work for CENB has also been conducted in a community driven manner, with a multi stakeholder approach and mind in our session, we tried to make sure that we had representation from different stakeholders, different genders and different regional universities. And the output document the output for CENB has been in the form of a document that is published on the website. It’s not the yet linked to their web (No audio) but by tomorrow, we should see it on that they should see on your screens as well and I will send you the link on the chat for the the direct link to the (No audio).
I hope everyone has received that in the chat.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we have.
>> RADHIKA: Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: And do send your full set of comments because we heard about 95% of what you were saying. It would be good to have the full context and if we can make sure that's actually put into the transcription that would be great.
>> RADHIKA: Absolutely.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: And so there's, I guess, support then from the individuals that participate in the CENB to continue in phase four and five, and continue to focus on some of the SDGs. I'm hopeful that we can get, you know, a formal request in ahead of the MAG meeting as well so that the MAG has that in front of them as we're deliberating all of the intersessional activities going forward.
It was also very impressive and very important work. And all the intersessional activities are or they wouldn't have been charter. I think the discussion here was to bring MAG members up to speed, that's been in the last year or years and make sure everyone understands where to find the information on the website and that it's there and the expectation, everybody becomes quite familiar with them so that when we move into the MAG meeting at the end of the month, with have both the past year's reports and status in mind, as well as thoughts with respect to future efforts as well.
Next week, we will be going through the MAG Working Group activities. So asking all of the chairs, cochairs, facilitators to get the reports out to the MAG ahead of time. I'm working on the ones that I'm responsible for as well. So I think we all need to work to meet those deadlines.
There were a couple of other AOBs I would like to come to quickly here and just to point out that Chengetai had put in the chatroom earlier the host country cochair, it's Dr. Daniella Bunstrop with economic affairs and energy in Germany and she did, indeed, do the presentation at the closing ceremony at IGF 2018.
So she will be with us at the end of the month and at the subsequent MAG meetings as well. And I'm very glad to have her there and, of course, have the bulk of the year here too and that's all of our activities.
And just a couple of quick updates and if you want, we can schedule a little bit more time on next week's meeting for some of them. There is a CSTD meeting next week. Typically the IGF, either the chair or the Secretariat have been invited to speak at the CSTD, and that we are required to submit a formal report to the CSTD as the next body and the oversight mechanism in the UN. It moves from the CSTD into ISOC and others. Chengetai will represent us in that meeting and I may participate remotely. A report has been sent to the CSTD. Once it's noted there, it will be up on our website as well. I don't know if that's happened in the last day or two.
But when it is posted, we will ask the Secretariat to send the note and ensure that we all have the link. Chengetai, is there anything else you want to say on the CSTD meeting. The other two is the HLPDC meeting and the World Economic Forum.
>> CHENGETAI: Yes, the report is on the website.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay. So if there aren't any further questions on the CSTD, the UN Secretary General on high level, continues the work in the deliberations. They are meeting I think it's next week in Geneva for the second and final there of their physical face to face meetings. You are still able to provide input up until the end of January. They are recognizing that doing it before their next face to face meeting is most helpful to them and certainly higher certainty that the comments will be taken on board.
They are still very keen to get some additional comments. I think they have had roughly 60 or 70 to date. They are supplementing that set of activities with a number of outreach activities including the ability to host your own meetings and they are also reaching out to, you know, various individuals and/or sort of smaller committee meetings for specific input. While input they requested focuses on principles and values, a lot of they are smaller committee meetings are now beginning to focus on mechanisms, functions, and sort of form. So I think it's, you know, becoming more clear that they hope to be able to provide some concrete recommendations on how to improve digital and collaboration, generally, and are looking for a wide range of inputs covering, again, values and principles, all the way to functions, mechanisms and forums. So I would encourage everybody to get involved and provide input if you haven't already.
I have participated in some of those meetings, as has Chengetai and DESA as well, and not in the context of representing an IGF position because there is no IGF position but certainly we are all able to speak about our own experiences, either because we participated in so many relevant forums or processes either through the IGF or, in fact, in our own work experiences as well.
Let me see, Veni is in the queue. I will turn to Veni and see if there's any other comments or reflections on the HLPDC and then just give a few additional words on the World Economic Forum in Davos. The deadline is the end of January to submit comments and their next meeting is next week. Chengetai may know the exact date. They will get a higher level of visibility across the full panel.
>> CHENGETAI: It's actually the following week, the 21st.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: So you have the end of this week and next week to get comments in. Veni?
>> VENI: Thanks, Lynn. Can you hear me?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Yes, we can.
>> VENI: Amazing! Technology works.
I just wanted to on the context of what you were saying about, you know, events and confidences and stuff that we are following, I wanted to I was wondering whether we could have some type maybe in our January meeting or in the April meeting. It's not urgent but there are a lot of developments necessity UN, especially at the UN General Assembly around cybersecurity and maybe it might be of interest for the MAG members to just get some information, you know, within five or ten minutes. It's not going to be longer on the latest developments. There are several resolutions which were passed in the last fall, in November and December. And since we whatever we do might have I mean, ideally somebody is in those groups established by the UN General Assembly, discussing cybersecurity might come to the IGF. You never know. Maybe we should extend an invitation somehow to the General Assembly or maybe you can do it.
I think it's a good thing for us to be informed and especially one of the groups is actually talking in their resolution that they will be open for consultations with the private sector, the civil society, the technical community, et cetera. That's all.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Veni those are very good points. I would propose that we have a short discussion on that at the next MAG meeting. It was mentioned as well earlier in the chatroom. And what Veni is referring to is that there were some proposals that have come forward on cybersecurity, one of them looks at an open ended Working Group. There are two sets of proposals coming in.
The inability to come to a report in the last session of the GGE and the enhanced cooperation. There has been a number of discussions recently in the UN on those topics.
So maybe we could just have a quick maybe 20 minutes or something on next week's call to ensure that everybody at least has you know, the kind of current status on their radar and then figure out what else we might do with it, either on future calls or even at a future MAG meeting.
I do also as you do Veni believe that they are important pieces of context for us as we actually look at, you know, the role. IGF can play and should play as we all move forward.
So I'm just waiting a moment to see if there are any other comments and then I will well, in the two minutes that are left here, let me just there was also a comment earlier on the World Economic Forum. I have been invited to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos again this year. I mean that follows from previous years and also from the previous chair who was invited as well.
I'm there in two capacities. One, I'm actually, as I think last year's MAG may remember, I'm actually cochair of something called the digital economy and society initiative. And also, of course, because the World Economic Forum as so many other activities are really trying to understand multi stakeholder community processes and really looking to get closer to some of those efforts.
We actually participate with one of their efforts called the Internet for all, which has some linkages with the national regional IGF initiatives where there are, in fact, intersecting efforts. There's also some activities with both the broadband commission, which, again, is looking at access and another effort which is led by the ITU as well on equals which is gender focused. So there's a number of activities where the web has a fairly significant presence and either they or we have been looking to engage with WEF and other partners on some of these efforts.
So that continues. The WEF has started a fairly significant effort on identity. They are trying to sort of understand what within their own processes would be helpful in terms of identities. They are also doing a lot on Internet of things and privacy and data and I have asked them many of you know that they have addressed us at each one of the open consultations and the stock taking at IGF 2018 as well. If there are some specific activities where they think we could be it could mutually useful, then they should they should call those out put it forward to review for the MAG and the community.
So that's part of the engagement exercise there as well. But clearly we will have more to talk about. That happens just before our MAG meeting. So we will have something to talk about during the MAG meeting itself.
We are at the top of the hour. Let me see if there are any quick comments or questions. Maybe Chengetai, you can put in in the chatroom our meeting time date and time next week or else send a reminder out to the MAG list.
And, again, the made items there, I would like to talk about some of the UN activities as Veni just mentioned and status reports from last year's Working Groups which there were five.
Chengetai, any final comments?
>> CHENGETAI: Yes, the next MAG meeting will be next Wednesday at 1100 hours UTC. We'll send out a note on the on the MAG list.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Okay. Thank you. Again, thank you to everybody. Stool Lynn, hi, it's Eleonora. Can I ask one final quick question?
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Sure.
>> ELEONORA: There was a question in the chat from Flavio about when the Working Group status reports would be expected exactly.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: So the we're going to have the discussions next Wednesday on this call. Some of Working Groups have like, the Working Group on evaluation, I think sort of submitted a report just before year end. We have been working on one with the multiyear strategic work program. I need to make one final turn of that and hopefully that will be out tomorrow. And, I mean, I think everybody should get their Working Group reports no later than the end of this week for next week's review.
But the review is on next week's MAG meeting.
>> ELEONORA: Okay. Thank you for that.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Any further questions Flavio or anyone else? Those Working Groups are a really important piece of MAG's work here.
Okay. Well, let me thank everybody. Thank everybody again for I mean, particularly again the Secretariat, it's very late for you there. Later even in some other parts of the world but really appreciate everybody's support and look forward to talking to everybody next week.
>> Thank you. Thank you very much, Lynn.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you, Carlos.